manually

Why wouldn't rest of Canada be approved. I have friends that could use this, but do not reside in Quebec.

mellon

I wish this could be the "rest of Canada" that would really screw Aeroplan.

FlyerTalker70

Perhaps those of us who live outside Quebec should organize on FT and reach out to a Canadian law firm to file a class action against érrorPlan. I know I've collected all of my érrorPlan receipts and suspect that if there's enough people in the same situation as me perhaps we would have some damming evidence against them. I'm not surprised that Quebec would turn away non-Quebec residents given how vastly different their legal and consumer protection laws are with the rest of Canada. However, maybe there is a law firm in Ontario or BC that feels that this case has legs to stand on elsewhere in Canada. IANAL but I think in the event of a class action, the law firms don't collect money from the clients but work on consignment collecting their fees during settlement.

One other data point I should point out - for those who say AC has to collect the fuel surcharge I should point out that this is not always the case. Fuel dumps are perfect evidence of this. In addition, for some markets AC serves (notably Australia) they are barred from charging much of a fuel surcharge. Yet they happily provide award availability on Aeroplan. Aeroplan has the choice to offer low-fee award tickets and chooses to gouge their customers!

-James

mia

Looking at the linked page it appears this is what the class action seeks, but it is not yet decided?

margarita girl

OMG, this is so awesome! Doesn't affect me as I've never redeemed for tickets with scam charges, but it's about time someone nailed AC/AE for their rip off fees! ^

Mwenenzi

AC thread--->Aeroplan notice for Quebec residents about class action lawsuit on fuel surcharges

GUWonder

RCyyz

My instinctive reaction is "I'm in".

The concept of what exactly is "all-inclusive" is interesting. Pragmatically I would argue that airport improvement fees and things like that are "legitimate" surcharges imposed by an external party ergo they can be considered separately in the same vein that HST is a tax that falls into a separate category. The fuel charges / YQ / "carrier surcharges" / scam charges are what we are rightfully arguing. And we have plenty of evidence, both anecdotal and actual, that taking flight xxx on carrier ZZ costs hundreds or thousands on an AE redemption but only a few dollars on say, a UA redemption.

To me the goal of any such lawsuit would be to eliminate the scam charges but leave the "legitimate" charges such as AIF, HST etc. But we also have to remember that this is AC. Why did they implement YQ the way they did? I'm on record here as being critical of AC for advertising low fares but then jacking them with YQ on revenue fares, let alone on AE redemptions. I don't think this really happens anymore, but there was a short period where I believe it did. AC is not in this to play the game fairly; they want / need the revenue and to their credit, they've done well financially which is generally reflected in both the stock price and in executive compensation.

If we go after AC for scam charges, I think we should - at least briefly - ponder what may be. AC already colludes with LH on TATL fares and with UA on transborder. While I absolutely believe there should be no scam charges on redemptions, we should proceed in a deliberate way and be mindful of how this could be executed. It's great to imagine (and fight for) a scamcharge-free world. But we should look beyond and structure arguments in such a way that we don't end up with greater collusion or different fees which could be construed as reasonable.

FlyerTalker70

Agree with you here. At the end of the day there are people who clearly benefit from the status-quo and those who don't. If you're willing to fly UA, LX and other * partners without the scam charge then having those two additional stopovers can be a real godsend. At the same time the award chart has remained relatively constant over time whereas UA, DL and others have been moving to a dynamic model. Perhaps eliminating those scam charges changes things. Ultimately, I think part of the question should be, to what extent should scamcharges be permitted. For instance, charging fuel surcharges for trans-ocean flights is common for many frequent flyer programs, most notably BA's Executive Club. However, where AC is unique is charging that fee across the board for any type of flight be it domestic, transborder or international. That being said, there is a strong argument to be made that all goodwill for Aeroplan will go away in 2020, particularly if AC significantly "enhances" the programme to use dynamic award pricing and eliminate many of the perks of the programme (i.e. free upgrades for UA elites redeeming Aeroplan awards on UA).

Safe Travels,

James

SparseFlyer

I am convinced that the Base Fare / YQ bull is due to:

1. The ability to price more dynamically based on a variable cost that affects multiple destinations without having to re-file all the fares

2. AC's TATL JV and revenue sharing agreements

3. Fare filing competition on TATL routes to appear higher on GDS fare pulls.

eigenvector

The lawsuit seeks damages under Quebec's Consumer Protection Act so it makes sense that only those covered by the Act would be able to participate.

Quebec has by far the most stringent consumer protection regime of any province.

eracerblue